One is frequently impelled to wonder at the peculiar trait of human psychology which leads people to gather together for the celebration of festivals. We do not allude here to national festivals, or even local festivals, in honor of some historic event or personage. We have in mind such apparently motiveless gatherings as the majority of music festivals. Some of them, of course, have a very definite purpose, and some, such as the Bayreuth Festival and the Mozart Festival at Salzburg, have a very obvious motive. But most of them seem to have no other _raison d'être_ than the instinctive desire of a number of people to gather into a crowd and make a big noise. Festivals of this sort are extraordinarily common in America. It is difficult to say whether the amount of labor involved in the organization of them could not be more profitably expended. Undoubtedly in territories where musical culture is as yet a delicate, doubtful growth they furnish a decided stimulation. To borrow a phrase from the expressive American slang, they are excellent contrivances for 'whooping things up.' But in a deeper sense they seem in the main rather futile. We may instance the case of the Worcester Festival to which we have already alluded. It has been held annually for fifty-six years and each year it has been very finely planned and carried out. Each year also it has cost much money. Yet during that time it has not brought into the light a single new composer, new singer or new instrumentalist; nor has it made Worcester and its environs any more musical than they have always been. Like most of its kind it is merely an inflated concert and the value of inflated concerts at stated intervals is at least open to discussion. These festivals are peculiarly American and seem to have grown out of the old musical conventions so dear to the hearts of the psalm-singing New Englanders. As far as we can discover, the first musical convention was instituted at Montpelier, Vermont, by Elijah K. Prouty and Moses Elia Cheney, both singing-school instructors. It seems to have been a combination of concert and musical debate. This was in 1839. Later conventions were held at Newberry, Windsor, Woodstock, Middlebury, and elsewhere in the Green Mountain state. In 1848 Chicago had a musical convention, held at the First Baptist Church, and another four years later under the direction of William Bradbury. Rochester (N. Y.), New York, Richmond, Washington, Quincy (Ill.), Jacksonville (Ill.), and North Reading (Mass.) took up the movement in turn under the direction of George F. Root. All these conventions were purely educational in character and were concerned chiefly with the art of teaching music.